tylercallister

[tylercallister]

Of Nature and Man … photo by @mellywong (at Pacifica, California) https://www.instagram.com/p/CkhInEFJ_ZL/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[tylercallister]

A man attains what he most yearns for only over a colossal span of time. Nothing he does is accomplished in a second, an hour, or a day. Everything is a single grain of sand added to a future sandcastle a decade hence. If he can’t see it this way, he will fail. If he can’t write a single word, he will never write a book. If he can’t lift a single dumbbell, he will never build a masculine physique. To be mighty, he must first be small. Everyday. Until he is big. Seek the tiniest possible change, and you will build. Over and over again. (at Port Orford, Oregon) https://www.instagram.com/p/CnDlfiRpjWj/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[tylercallister]

Just south of Oregon. Highway 101. End of 2022. #trees #forest #californiaredwoods #naturephotography #outdoors #vintagephotography #photosthatlooklikepaintings #oregon #highway101 (at Highway 101 California) https://www.instagram.com/p/Cm9kX0HPyIL/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[tylercallister]

“Only connect.” — E.M. Forster By this the great man surely meant only connect with Instagram all day long while you wallow in sadness, despair, and soul-crushing ennui. (at Grants Pass, Oregon) https://www.instagram.com/p/CHs9iralu2W/?igshid=1rok5skdia2s2

[tylercallister]

[1/2] “What the hell happened to the America that I know and love?” I’m not so sure I ever did *love* it — but it wasn’t for a lack of wanting to. I am the son of my parents’ generation (Vietnam) and my grandparents (WWII) but I personally grew up with no war to fight, no shores to defend. I am the bastard child of the warless. That’s because of a simple truth: As the 20th Century came to a close, there was no military draft, and in the highly educated, erudite Northern States, no tradition of signing up for Hell in order to “become a man.” (In San Francisco, when you turn 18, it’s just another day.) When I popped out like a Christmas ham from my mother’s womb in 1984, and George Orwell’s doom-and-gloom year came to a close with nary a telescreen screen in sight, wars DID rage (both cold and warm), but none for which I was called. Never did Uncle Sam tap me on the shoulder, and say, “Son, it’s your turn.” For my generation, it’s not that we didn’t love America (the sizzling BBQ’s, fireworks, and sparklers proved it to be worthwhile), it’s that we lacked the all-important, grandfatherly coinage: Skin in the Game. We GOT the premise, recited the pledge of Allegiance. We saw the value of democracy, free speech, and Sunday football. But in no way was our own comfort threatened in order to maintain those values. We didn’t have to fight for it, to put our own baggy pants hides on the line. So the P-Word, PATRIOTISM, for us, was a story, something we read about in civics class. The little American flag hung limply above our high school classroom’s chalkboard, like a used condom on a moonlit nightstand. But overall, inexorably — and stay with me on this one — as time has worn on, I have come to believe that this state of affairs has been a GOOD thing. Given the myriad possible universes we could have been born into, we were born into the one that put American Patriotism™ on our plates as a matter of faith for the last 45 years, and not, for most us, as a matter of honor, duty and sacrifice. [continued>>] (at Medford, Oregon) https://www.instagram.com/p/CH6euPVFz0A/?igshid=10r58fv56cu3z

[tylercallister]

Fear

What if the only thing holding you back was fear? 

If all it took was work, focus — and the willingness to take the leap? 

What if everything you've known in your life up to this point has been nothing but you waiting, at the edge of the diving board, looking down? 

Don't look down. Close your eyes. And leap. 

[tylercallister]

Not-knowingness

Even in things we’re sure about, there’s an essential unsureness. All of life is like this. We know, but we don’t know. 

Part of growing up, of gaining wisdom, is learning to live with this paradox — and love and live within it. 

Did I pick the right career? Some days I’m sure I did; other days I don’t know. 

Being with that understanding is something that, ideally, I could make my peace with. This is not to say that it doesn’t matter what choices you make. It matters and you should make your choices vigorously -- and with all your soul -- and then accept that, along the way, you still won’t know. 

There’s an undercurrent of not-knowing. 

Am I in the right relationship? The right town? The right frame of mind? The right group of friends? The point is, I made a choice, and I’m living and putting effort towards growing it, and my satisfaction comes from that, not from having made the exact right choice -- as if such a thing could exist.  

When I make my choices wisely, and then accept, with open eyes and heart, that I don’t know, happiness flows.

[tylercallister]

Don’t wait

You don't have to wait for everything to be settled. For all things to be confirmed. For your life to feel "ready."

You can just do it — whatever it is that you've been waiting on. 

Waiting, most of the time, is a euphemism for fear.

It's a bait and switch. 

Don't bait yourself. Don't switch. 

Just leap. 

[tylercallister]

Words in print

[tylercallister]

Open up

Editorial: Find something.

Reporter: I'm on it.

Editorial: Make it snappy.

[tylercallister]

What is the purpose of life?

It is often wondered what life’s real purpose is. From time to time, we forget about this problem, but most of us return to it, again and again — even if only to wonder what we ought to do next. 

Why am I here? 

Why do I exist? 

But wonderings such as these represent a chink in our mental model of the world. They continually trap us in the tractor beam of self-reflection, pulling us into navel gazing or despair. 

There is a reason why most of us choose to simply ignore these big, heady questions: It is not a happy game to play. 

The solution, therefore, is to not play it. 

Rather than pester ourselves with esoteric inquiries about the purpose of life, we should simply ask, 

What will I do? 

In this lies its own self-reinforcing answer. As you do, so you discover purpose. 

So in the end, what is the purpose of life? The answer is simpler and more profound that it sounds: It is already there, the moment you take the first step. 

[tylercallister]

The Multiplicity of You

“Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself; (I am large, I contain multitudes.)”

-Whitman

What defines you? What is going to define the next you — and you, and you, and you — that will come? 

There lies within you multiple you’s. 

It’s a multiplicity of you’s. 

Are you a husband, a wife, a gardener, a friend? A kind neighbor helping out? 

Are you a fierce lawyer, fighting for a cause? 

An artist, an activist, a poet, a monk? 

An explosion of fireworks in the night sky? 

You can — indeed, must — be all of these you’s. 

Whatever you’s you wish. 

[tylercallister]

What if humanity ends?

There’s a big problem with humankind going extinct. 

Actually, there are a couple of problems. 

The first is that the apocalypse wouldn’t just kill everyone currently alive at that moment. It would cancel any potential happiness and flourishing of future generations born into the world. We probably haven’t reached the peak of human wellbeing — there may be much more to be enjoyed, and we don’t want to (or probably shouldn’t) pull the rug out from under the yet-to-be-born. Deeper states of creativity, bliss, and meaning may await those who exist in the year 2150, and to stop that from happening before it has a chance to, I think most of us would find sad. 

So if the Big One hit tomorrow, leaving civilization in corpses and ashes, the idea doesn’t just suck because we’d be dead. It sucks because of all the people who could’ve been. 

But there is a second, and more precarious, reason that the end of humankind would be deeply, horribly, disorientingly bad. It would be the end of the human story. 

For generations, we’ve been writing it. And each chapter builds on the last. And that’s a substantial source of meaning, whether we recognize it individually or not, for all of us collectively. 

Even if on an individual level we don’t find the arc of humanity’s progress to be particularly captivating as we watch TV or commute to work, as a whole humankind has an awareness of itself, and, especially for those of us in the developed world, we recognize its grandness. We’ve come a long way. It took a lot of effort crawl out of the jungle and into the modern city. 

So we’re faced with an existential crisis. A societal existential crisis. The kind that gives waking up in the morning a dull, gray, hue. The kind that when you look out the window on a dreary day in midwinter, and you see the traffic backed up like a clogged drain, and you feel the weight of your own body like a lead armor, life can feel meaningless. You might think, Why bother if it’s all going to end? 

This is why, it would be better, much better, if we worked to make sure humankind lives on for thousands more generations. 

And this is why paying attention to the parallel paths of creating your personal life’s meaning, while also keeping the world’s meaning in view, is so important. This is why when you’re implored, by the purveyors of cheesy inspirational graduation speeches, to change the world, you ought to listen. Not necessarily because you, as one tiny speck in the universe, are going to change it, but because the world’s story is part of your story. 

[tylercallister]

Time to contemplate meaning?

Has your life become dull? Repetitive? Hollow? 

Is it bereft of meaning? 

Sometimes the answer, the fix, is to do something different. A new hobby, conversation, or frightening goal to take on. 

Other times, the answer lies in reframing what you’ve already got: Reinterpret the meaning of the story that you’re telling about your life. Readjust the characters, tinker with the plot — or write a new chapter. 

Either way, you’ll notice that the meaning of the story comes from you, and you alone. You are the sole arbiter of meaning. 

People often wonder, What is the meaning of life? What’s the purpose of the universe? 

It’s probably the wrong question to ask. 

A better one is: 

What meaning will I make? What will I do? 

In that, lies the meaning. 

[tylercallister]

What does it take?

What risks will you forge, the iron shaped by your own hand, as you create something new — and send it out into the world? 

What place will you take in the pantheon of the ordinary — one small human, as large as you want to be? 

What spark will you strike, when the moment shows up, inviting, begging you you to join, to make an impact? 

What time will you spend — and what will you waste — when the clock keeps ticking but you cannot see it, and you have no idea how much time you have left? 

Where will you be, when the Work calls you to be bigger than you are — or thought you could be?  

[tylercallister]

What do Google and Facebook really want?

What do Google and Facebook actually want? I mean, what do those companies want to extract from you? 

This is all going to sound hyperbolic and you’ll be thinking, “No, no, Tyler, that’s not what they want, they just want to make money like everyone else.” Well, you’ll be wrong. They don’t just want money. 

What they really want is this: to steal your agency. They believe that individual humans beings don’t make good decisions, and that therefore algorithms should make decisions for you. This is woven throughout Silicon Valley’s business models, their operations, their very philosophy. It is what gets them out of bed in the morning: Build a world steered by algorithms, not individuals. Forget human authorship, creativity, and the deep thought required to make something new — and to feel a sense of meaning. Replace thousands of years worth of growing human freedom and agency with a spectacular “utopia” that just happens to take you — as a thinking, feeling, free person who directs your own life — out of the loop.

Why would they want this? What they envision is a fantastical techno-collectivism. They believe that the “wisdom of the crowd” and the “hive mind” are better than your thoughts and creativity as an individual person. Where did they get this idea? Well, they’ve been to Burning Man a few times, they’ve read some hippy books on their Kindle, they’ve dropped some acid and (very briefly) felt love for all of humanity. Then they wake up in the morning and they think, “I know! Let’s just build a massive collective consciousness through our iPhones! That will finally bring out the love and Kumbaya feeling I get at Burning Man to the whole world!” It all sounds great — until you come up against the reality of actually making that happen: the limits of our understanding of the human brain, the messiness of technology and human nature, and the fact that consciousness —your subjective experience — remains a complete scientific mystery. The truth is, their vision is utopian, probably impossible, and laced with a subconscious greed.

This is why they worship the algorithm and not the feelings, thoughts, creativity, consciousness, and freedom of a single person.

All that said, perhaps you agree with them, that the “collective” mind ought to be privileged, and that the world should become some kind of virtual reality Burning Man. Maybe you like that idea. Maybe it tickles your fancy. But you have to ask yourself whether you’re willing to give up your freedom and sense that you are in control of your own life, all for a wild gamble on their wanna-be-utopian fantasy.

It’s up to you.